


A Drink with a Ghost

by aflawedfashion



Category: Defiance (TV)
Genre: Angst, But I will deal with the fallout in fic, But no one dies in this fic, Friendship, Gen, I don't like killing characters nearly as much as canon, Male-Female Friendship, Mentions of a canon major character death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-26
Updated: 2017-02-26
Packaged: 2018-09-26 23:42:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,351
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9932267
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aflawedfashion/pseuds/aflawedfashion
Summary: Seven months after the end of season 2, Nolan remembers a promise he made to Tommy as he walks into the NeedWant feeling like it's only been days.





	

_Soon as we get this whole "end of the world" thing sorted out, we get Irisa back to normal, not only am I gonna pay you back with interest, I'm going to take you out, get you good and drunk. I don't think I've ever seen you good and drunk._  
\-- Joshua Nolan

Nolan swirled his drink in his hand as he wistfully stared at two young men laughing together across the bar, downing shots like they didn’t have a care in the world, like they weren’t trapped in a post-apocalyptic hellhole that was slowly destroying everything they loved. And maybe they weren’t. Maybe they were the lucky ones. Maybe they were the ones who didn't dream of war and death every time they closed their eyes.

They were young, younger than Irisa. This hybrid world created by war was the only one they had ever known. They grew up with digbaa trees and hellbugs, never feeling out of place on their own planet, never mourning the loss of their home. Their smiles were untainted by the past that haunted every human and Votan old enough to remember the war and what came before.

Most days, Nolan would have been happy for them, happy for a sign that the world was moving forward, but not that night. That night, there was another young man on his mind, a man who died when he was hardly older than they were.

Tommy Lasalle should have been downing shots with them, not buried in the ground.

Nolan kept picturing Tommy raising his glass in a toast from across the room, but he knew better than to dwell on that image. Over the years, he had lost too much time dreaming of what should have been, dreaming of his sister meeting Irisa and his parents living in an old world house like the one Rafe McCawley had built. They would have liked that, but those fantasies only made it harder to live in the real world, harder to appreciate what he had.

As he felt himself falling into his memories despite his better judgment, a fist hit his shoulder, thrusting him back into the real world. “Hey!”

“Sorry,” Berlin said, giving him a sheepish look. “I was going for a playful arm punch, but I think I punched you the regular way.”

Nolan shrugged as he rubbed his shoulder. “I’ve been hit harder.”

“For what it’s worth, it was meant to be a friendly gesture,” she said as she slid into the stool next to his, her eyes struggling to meet his. “Wasn’t sure you’d really want to be around me after what I did, but I thought I'd take my chances.”

“Wouldn't be Defiance if we weren't drinking with our enemies,” Nolan said, hardly thinking about his words as he stared into his glass, focused more on trying to forget the imaginary man across the bar than talking with the real woman beside him.

“Oh, so we’re enemies now?” Berlin teased, and the corners of Nolan's mouth twitched into an involuntary smile. He was suddenly glad to have someone real to talk to.

“I haven’t decided what we are yet, but I’ve got a lot of scotch in front of me, and we can reevaluate after we're drunk.” With a tilt of his head, Nolan raised his glass in her direction. “No one gets punched again by the end of the evening, and we can call ourselves friends.”

“Deal,” she said with a smile that fell as she studied his face. “You ok? You look like shtako.”

Nolan scratched his beard, struggling to say what he could hardly accept as real, what he wished was a bad nightmare. “Tommy’s dead.”

Berlin grew stiff, taking deep, steady breaths, and Nolan prepared himself for a punch in the face. If she believed she had earned his anger for punching his daughter in the face, he had surely earned hers for raising the woman who killed the person she loved.

Nolan couldn't help thinking that if he had just listened to Irisa years ago and never tried to make her settle down in Defiance with him, Tommy would still be alive. Maybe he would be sitting in the NeedWant, enjoying life the way he deserved to enjoy it. Maybe he and Berlin would have lived happily ever after.

“Seven months and it still barely feels real,” Berlin finally said, breaking the silence without a hint of the anger Nolan expected. There was only sadness in her voice. “Sometimes I still expect to find him in the lawkeeper's office before I remember he won’t be there. He’ll never be there again.”

“Feels like a long blurry week for me. With everything that happened, I barely kept track of time before spending seven months unconscious.” Nolan set his glass down and turned to look at her. “Seven months the world went on without me.”

“I’m sorry,” Berlin said, tentatively placing her hand on his shoulder. “But for whatever it's worth, in seven months, it will hurt a little less.”

“I know… logically, I know.” Nolan shook his head, trying to shake the hopelessness he felt. “Haven't Indogenes invented a way to bypass feelings yet? I could really use that right now.”

Berlin scoffed. “I wish.”

“I wish a lot of things.” Nolan smiled sadly into his glass.

For a moment, Berlin didn't say anything, letting the thought hang in the air before whispering, “Me too.”

Nolan shifted his glass between his hands, trying to distract himself from memories as vivid as the present. “I can still picture snowflakes falling on his face as the life drained from his eyes. I can feel his ribs cracking under my hands as I tried to revive him.” He took a drink. “There’s no escaping what happened. Even five years from now, when I won't be thinking about it every day, there will still be nights the nightmares wake me up.”

“I know,” Berlin said, her voice barely above a whisper as she joined him in examining the patterns on the bar. “I can still hear my brother screaming as the VC captured him while I hid from sight. His voice echoes in my head like it wasn't 20 years ago.”

“I can’t imagine being alone at that age.”

“I can hardly imagine it, and I lived it.” Berlin leaned forward, a hardness in her eyes. “I _survived_ it, and I learned that the pain you feel on the worst days of your life won’t kill you. It will stay with you forever, but it changes. It becomes a part of who you are. You learn to live with it. Eventually you can’t imagine who you’d be without it. Eventually you sit in a bar and talk about it with dry eyes.”

“I learned that lesson too late.” Nolan shook his head. “After my sister was killed, I thought the pain would kill me too, and I gave up on my humanity. I shut down, tried not to think about her death, didn't even mention she existed for most of my adult life. It was too painful to think about her… I couldn't live with it.” He tilted his head to the side. “Your way’s definitely healthier.”

“Maybe, but I’m no saint. I became the propaganda arm of a fascist regime. I saw hints of their corruption, but they gave me a family, so I convinced myself that the good outweighed the bad.”

“Trust me; you're by far the better person here. You never went on a genocidal rampage.”

“No.” Berlin took a drink. “I never did that. I prefer to keep my rage targeted at whichever person I decide deserves it, and I beat the shit out of them. I know it's not usually the right thing to do, but it can be _so_ satisfying.” She smiled, pride in her eyes. “Have I ever told you I shot my boyfriend's lawyer in the foot once?”

“Jesus,” he said as he let out an unexpected laugh. “This really is a town of fucked up people.”

“Except for those two apparently.” Berlin pointed at the two men across the bar.

“I think that those two might be a sign,” Nolan said, his slurring together. “A sign that frat boys are about to make a return to society.”

“Frat boys?” Berlin asked, arching her eyebrows.

“Oh, be very glad you don’t know what a frat boy is. You would punch one in the face for sure.”

“I want to punch them in the face already, and I don’t even know what they are talking about.”

“Have you ever considered that you have an issue with violence?”

“Yeah, sure, we can talk about my issue with violence right after we talk about the fact that you’re gunning for Amanda’s position as town alcoholic.”

Nolan threw his hands up in the air in a mock surrender. “Point made.”

“Look, I’m sorry I punched Irisa.”

“You’re not,” Nolan said, refilling his glass.

“No, I’m not.” Berlin paused. “You ok with that or should I just leave now? We don’t have to get to the bottom of that bottle to work this out.”

“No, stay.”

“Why?”

Nolan refilled her glass. “Because I get it. I don’t like it, but I get it. If someone had killed Amanda, even if they were possessed by arch tech, I would have a hard time not pressing a gun to their head. Logic be damned.”

“Thank you.” Berlin smiled sadly as she took the glass. “I used to think I was a logical person. Then I came to this town.”

“I think you have to redefine logic in this town.”

Berlin raised her glass. “Isn’t that the truth.”

One of the young men across the bar shouted something Nolan couldn’t quite make out, and people all around the bar turned to watch their ongoing celebration. As he surveyed the room, Nolan's attention was caught by an older couple in the corner who looked up from their books, and Nolan realized people probably started coming here as their homes lost power. This wasn’t just a sex club anymore. So much had changed since he had been gone.

He took another drink and grimaced. Even the scotch had changed.

“They started watering it down after Amanda stopped working here,” Berlin said. “It’s half scotch, half some Votan concoction that’s not nearly as potent, but it is supposed to taste just like scotch.”

He swirled the liquid in his glass, frowning at it before gulping it all down. “It does not.” He winced at the aftertaste.

“I can’t tell the difference,” Berlin said. “But Amanda’s still got the real stuff. She says this is a crime against humanity, but no one in here can afford the real thing anymore.”

“She is absolutely right. The woman knows her scotch.” Nolan smiled as he refilled his glass. “But I came in here to get drunk with a ghost, and I figure if I get drunk enough, I’ll stop being able to taste the difference. And maybe I’ll stop seeing the ghost too.”

“The ghost?”

“The ghost of E-Rep lawkeepers past.”

“Tommy.”

“That’s the one.” Nolan shook his head. “I didn’t mean to come in here tonight. I was supposed to meet Amanda to get filled in on the seven-month hole in my life when I remembered a promise I made to Tommy before he died. I said I’d take him out, and we’d get drunk together. Next thing I know, I’m canceling on Amanda and sitting alone at this bar ordering a bottle of scotch and two glasses.”

“This glass was for him,” Berlin stated.

A painful silence fell between them. After a moment, Nolan turned to Berlin as she stared into her glass with pain written across her face and tears threatening to fall from her eyes.

“Hey,” he said, nudging her shoulder. “Don’t let me bring you down. As I said, I feel like all this happened last week. You don't need to wallow with me.”

“No,” she said, shaking her head and gathering herself. “I do. I need this as much as you do.” She took a deep breath. “You know we never had a proper memorial for him? I got drunk the night he died, and I gave a toast, but I didn’t talk about him, not the way you’re supposed to when someone dies.”

“Why not?”

“Amanda and I had him buried, but he wasn’t religious, and he didn’t have any family, so it was just the two of us standing over his grave… snow falling on freshly overturned dirt… it looked every bit the tragedy it was. After that, every time someone tried to talk to me about him, I either wanted to scream or burst into tears, so I tried to bury it all, and that worked pretty well until all those unresolved feelings poured out through my fist into Irisa’s face.”  

Berlin paused, looking at him as if she were expecting him to say something, probably expecting him to defend Irisa, but there was nothing he needed to say that she didn’t already know.

“It wasn’t like no one did anything,” she continued. “Amanda bought everyone a round of drinks and had a wake in the NeedWant, but I wasn't there. Seven months ago I wasn't ready to say goodbye, but I think I’m finally ready to have that drink in his honor, so let’s drink to Tommy.”

She grabbed the bottle, refilling their glasses. The hangover would be rough. “Have I ever told you about my first date with Tommy? There were handcuffs involved.” She smirked as she arched her eyebrows. “But not in the way you think.”

“Handcuffs?” Nolan grinned. “I’m not sure I want to hear that.”

“You want to hear it slightly more than I want to hear you tell me the last words he ever said, but I expect you to tell me that too.”

“Deal,” Nolan said as he reached out for a toast.

Clinking their glasses together, Berlin said, “To Tommy LaSalle and all the ghosts who haunt our lives.”

“To all our ghosts.”


End file.
